This really cool photo was taken by my old friend Reed several years ago (Nov 2018). I clearly liked the image and must have saved it to my iPhone. I assume it’s a petrochemical stain and it forms a neat sunburst pattern. My inner nerd puts him on the threshold of a time-space portal. But the really odd thing is that over the years I built a false memory around it. I thought I could truly recall the moment I snapped it, ostensibly in Chicago, and even owned shoes similar to those. Each time I glanced at it further cemented the erroneous recollection (“fake news!”). I posted it last week and went to annotate the picture only to realize it wasn’t my original. Tilt. Memory is so weird….
And, you know what? I had another bad memory recently that also shook me to the core (early-onset dementia?). The Redskins were driving for the lead in Candlestick Park against the 49ers late in a 1993 play-off game. It was a sloppy affair, replete with turnovers on both sides, but also very exciting. A bad hand-off between Mark Rypien and Brian Mitchell sealed our fate. The thing is, for the nearly 30 years since that play, I had remembered it as Kelvin Bryant who dropped that football. KB being a former Tarheel gave me a clear mental connection, who also had the career-long tendency to fumble-itis. So, I was reminiscing with my friend Mike about great Skins games that had gone south. The big ones that got away. Mind you, he has a steel-trap memory for these arcane sports moments, which should have been my first and best clue. He swore up and down it was Brain Mitchell. I was equally sure it was KB. Google settled the issue all too quickly for my liking (in the old days, I could have remained in my blissful world of self-assurance… this is progress??). My normally solid recall (med school tests nothing at all, if not that) had failed me. I was stunned. And now I’m looking for the third one, as 3’s are the rule with these things….
And I think I now know the cause — memory replacement or convergence. UNC has always been chiefly a “hoops” powerhouse (few things in sports gave me more pleasure than beating Duke those last meetings against Coach K this year!). Football was mostly a social, also-ran event. A memorable quote from a college buddy after a home loss to Navy: “You know you suck when you’re losing to the service academies.” Good for sipping Bacardi 151 and Coke before frat-court meet-ups on home weekends and with major eye-candy. But Freshman year (1982), we were actually ranked 3rd in the nation and faced Dan Marino and Pitt on the road. Kelvin Bryant was our star tailback at the time, but we came up just short that night in a defensive struggle, 7-6. I just Googled it and, sure enough, UNC’s biggest threat came at the end of the first half when KB caught a pass from Rod Elkins, only to fumble it at the Pitt 14 yard-line. It seems I simply grafted that disappointment directly onto another one that came about ten years later. It’s more efficient, in a way, if you think about it. Why have two people making key fumbles when you can concentrate the blame on one? Sorry, KB, I take half of it all back. Memory is a funny, fallible and fungible thing. But I do know for sure that we beat Duke in the Final Four this year. And we’ll always have that!!
Great Exudations 